Lagenanectes Richterae — One of the Earliest Elasmosaurs

Valerie Varnuska resides in Westbury, NY, and engages in a number outdoor activities including hiking and stargazing. Valerie Varnuska is also interested in paleontology, the study of life’s history based on fossils.

According to Sci News, in August 2017 a paleontologist published a paper in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology describing the discovery of a partly-preserved skeleton of among the earliest known elasmosaurs, belonging to the Early Cretaceous period (130 million years ago) of Germany. While private fossil collectors retrieved the bones from an unused clay pit in northern Germany near Sarstedt in 1964, it was only recently that the Lower Saxony State Museum invited the paleontologists to study the species.

Belonging to a family of plesiosaurs, elasmosaurs lived around 66 million to 145 million years ago during the Cretaceous period. They were completely suited to aquatic life, possessing a very long neck, paddle-like limbs, and a streamlined body.

The newly identified elasmosaur was named Lagenanectes richterae, and measured 26 feet long, with bones showing signs of chronic bacterial infection. These elasmosaurs prospered throughout the world and may have originated from the seas that previously covered Western Europe.